


While We Wait for a Better World

by AstroGirl



Series: While We Wait for a Better World [1]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Bad Puns, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Hopeful Ending, Kid Fic, Loss, Pie, Post-Undertale Neutral Route - Exiled Queen Ending, Romance, Soul Sex, non-human concepts of gender and sex, skelepreg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-05
Updated: 2017-03-05
Packaged: 2018-09-28 14:01:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 18,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10111478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AstroGirl/pseuds/AstroGirl
Summary: Sans has lost his brother.  Toriel has lost her children and her kingdom.  In their own very different ways, neither of them sees much of a future.  But that doesn't have to stop them from making one together.





	1. PART I: When Is a Door Not a Door?

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [While We Wait for a Better World](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15705498) by [meerkat_hater](https://archiveofourown.org/users/meerkat_hater/pseuds/meerkat_hater)



> This was written for Gen Prompt Bingo, for the prompt "heirs." Fortunately, Gen Prompt Bingo doesn't require the resulting stories to actually be gen, because this one is just embarrassingly shippy.
> 
> This is set in the "exiled queen" neutral ending. In this particular variant, not only is Asgore dead, but the human has also killed Papyrus, Undyne, and (probably) Flowey, as well as at least a couple of other people. (Basically, the player was a giant jerk.)
> 
> The "Mature" rating is for one brief sex scene in Chapter 2, and a more explicit (but very non-human) one in Chapter 3.

**PART I: When Is a Door Not a Door?**

Sans wakes slowly from a fitful, half-familiar dream. Something about a flower, something about bones, something about... 

About Papyrus.

He opens his eye sockets. Artificial afternoon light is streaming in through his window. Outside, he can hear snow birds singing carols to each other. Seems like a pretty nice day.

And, yep. His brother is still dead.

He's not sure exactly how many days it's been. Not that it really matters. There's never been much of a pattern in the timeline lengths. This one will last as long as it lasts. He's just gotta wait it out. It's no different than things have ever been, really. Just... a little more difficult. Or, OK, maybe a lot more difficult.

Except, of course, that if the kid was the anomaly, and the kid is gone... But, nah. Nah. He doesn't think it's that simple. It _can't_ be that simple. The kid may have been the most recent piece of the puzzle, but reality hasn't been stable for a very long time, and it's not going to suddenly start now. Right? 

He wants to go back to sleep, but when he closes his eyes again, that question keeps floating around behind them, and lying here thinking about it isn't going to do him or his brother any good. With a groan that might, to an outside observer, sound misleadingly like a laugh, he levers himself up out of the bed. He'll go and get some food. That's always a good distraction. He probably should, anyway; he can't remember the last time he ate.

But when opens the refrigerator, it's full of spaghetti, and he _can't_. He just _can't_.

Welp. Grillby's it is, then. Maybe he'll get lucky, at this time of day, and there won't be anybody there.

**

He isn't lucky. Half the regulars are there when he walks in: Birdy, that drunk bunny who's always hitting on him, all of the dogs. Correction. All of the _remaining_ dogs. Dogamy and Dogaressa's chairs are conspicuously, accusingly empty.

He slouches towards the bar, his hoodie pulled close around his face, hoping this time they'll just ignore him. He's not sure he can handle another round of consolations.

"Sans!"

"Hey, it's Sans!"

He waves feebly and turns away, but they keep calling his name. "Hey, guys," he says, defeated, and tries to think of a joke to change the subject before it even comes up, but this time they finally seem to have found something else to talk about.

"Hey, Sansy," says the bunny, still almost sober, this early in the day. "Didja hear? They kicked the queen outta the castle!"

"Yeah?" says Sans. "Man, that's too bad for her. Sounds like a royal pain."

They all groan. It actually makes him feel a little better, for a moment.

"It's true," says Birdy. "She started going on about how the next time a human falls down here, we should make friends with 'em instead of taking their soul, and it started a riot. People were storming the castle, demanding for her to leave. So she did. Went off to live in exile in the Ruins. Doggo says he saw her." He jerks a wing in Doggo's direction.

"That's right!" Doggo barks, from his half-empty table. "I did! She was moving. Moving fast, through town, all by herself. I challenged her. You know, in case she turned out to be a human. I asked her where she was going, and she said 'I am going home.'"

"Guess that means we're an anarchy now," says the bunny. "We can do whatever we want. I want free beer and hot guys!"

Sans ignores this, and doesn't bother listening to whatever sarcastic comment Grillby crackles from behind the bar in response, either.

The Ruins, he's thinking. Home. _Huh._

"Interesting," he says.

He orders a burger and eats it in silence as everyone around him continues to chatter about royalty and riots. When he's done, he actually pays his tab.

He doesn't go back to his house.

**

"Knock knock."

Silence. Well, it's not like he had any good reason to expect an answer. After all, their routine's been pretty thoroughly disrupted lately. She might not be listening. She might not be home.

She might have only ever wanted to extract a promise from him, and has no reason to talk to him anymore. He likes to think he's a better judge of people than that, even through a door, but the evidence for that has admittedly been kinda slim lately.

Or he might be wrong in his assumption. It might not be her. She might have been dead all this time, dusted by the kid on their way out of the Ruins.

He raps on the door again, then splays his bony fingers against it, as if by pressing hard enough he could reach through it to the other side. (He can't, of course. There are no shortcuts into the unknown. At least, none he's ever been stupid enough to try.)

"Knock knock."

Nothing.

"Well, it was worth a shot." He lowers his hand, but doesn't turn to go. Suddenly, even the lazy way home feels like entirely too much work. Maybe he'll just say here. Just lean against the door and fall asleep. Maybe he'll– 

Her voice comes through the door, hesitant and quiet. "Who– Who is there?"

He leans forward eagerly. "Home," he says.

There's another silence, just long enough to make him wonder if she's changed her mind. Then, "Home who?"

"Ho, man, I was _really_ hoping you would answer this door!"

She doesn't laugh. Well, it wasn't exactly his best. He's been a little off his game lately.

"Hey– " he starts to say, and from behind the door comes something that might be a muffled sob. "Oh, come on, it wasn't _that_ bad, was it?"

_That_ , mercifully, gets a laugh. "I am sorry," she says. "I did not know if I would hear from you again I... I am glad to hear your voice."

"Me too," he says. Then, in a lower tone, "So, this thing does open, huh?"

"Oh, my friend." The laughter is gone from her voice now. "I fear that nothing good ever comes of it when it does."

He can't exactly argue with that. Still... "Kinda wish you'd open it anyway." It's the first time he's asked. He's always figured people should be allowed to keep their secrets.

"I cannot." She sounds distressed.

"Yeah, I get it. It's just..." He feels a faint prickle of magic building up somewhere in his eye sockets and blinks it away, annoyed, before it can start to form into anything as embarrassing as tears. "Sorry. Don't wanna make you do anything you don't want to do. I guess I just... kind of needed a friend today. And figured maybe you did, too. Thought it might be better face-to-face." He forces himself to chuckle. "But, hey, never mind. This is okay. You know I a- _door_ the sound of your voice."

He waits for the laugh that will tell him that it _is_ okay, that they can go back to the way things were and pretend that nothing has happened to either of them. Instead, there's a long pause, and the sound of a lock being released.

The door swings open, and there she is. Queen Toriel. His Door Lady.

At first, she looks over his head and past him, then, as he scuffs his foot a little to draw her attention, she finds his eye level. For a long moment, she only stares at him, as if she's surprised by his appearance. Well, he knows he's not exactly much to look at. Nobody ever accused him of being the handsome one in his family.

He should probably say something, but he's not at all sure what. "Hello, your majesty"? "Hey, by the way, I just want to let you know I kept your damn promise"? Some kind of pun about seeing, or faces? Maybe just "thanks"?

He's about to go for that last one, when he's suddenly engulfed in a big, furry hug.

"Oh, hey," he says, startled not only by the hug itself, but by the feel of it. Door Lady – Toriel – is taller than Papyrus, and infinitely more solid. He can feel flesh and muscle pressed against him, and when he turns his head slightly, the soft white fur of her ear tickles his nose socket. It's weird how much there is to her, when in his mind she's always been nothing but a disembodied voice.

He puts his arms around her and returns the hug. It's less awkward than he would have expected. "Thanks," he says, after all. Then, "Never been hugged by a queen before."

She lets him go, her hands sliding slowly from the back of his hoodie, and stands upright again. "So. You know who I am." She looks embarrassed, he thinks. Embarrassed, and a little sad.

"Yeah," he says. "Sorry." Sorry for accidentally finding out her secret, he means, but she seems to misunderstand. 

"Do not be sorry," she says. "It was foolish of me to try to regain my former position, after spending so long hiding here doing nothing. Nothing that could make any real difference."

This is probably Sans's cue to tell her not to be so hard on herself. Which she really shouldn't. But somehow, he can't quite bring himself to do it.

"This is where I belong," she continues. "I have decided to accept that. It is why I still did not want to open the door."

"Gonna live here by yourself because nobody wants you around, huh? Well, fortunately for you– " He gestures to himself, to the rib cage visible through his open hoodie. "–I'm no body."

She giggles, almost reflexively, he thinks, but she's giving him a strange, quizzical look underneath it.

"To be honest," he says, "I'm not exactly sure how I feel about your politics." He keeps his voice steady and even. "From what I've seen, trusting humans ain't the world's best policy. But I've heard you slinging knock knock jokes, and based on that, I say if they don't want you around, lady, you're too good for 'em."

"Oh," she says, quietly.

"So, yeah, I've thought it over, and, far as I'm concerned, you and I are still friends." He _hasn't_ thought it over, not really, but even as he says it, he decides to let it be true. If he's going to blame her, he has to keep blaming himself, and that sort of thing is just exhausting. "I mean, I need _somebody_ to listen to my jokes."

She smiles at him. It's a remarkably cheering sight. "May I ask, what is your name? Since you now know mine."

"Sans," he says "Sans the skeleton. Though that last part's probably obvious."

"Sans," she says. "Would you like to come in and have some tea?"

** 

She takes him inside, up a flight of stairs and into a house that looks just like Asgore's – although he supposes it's more accurate to say that Asgore's looks like this one. She sits him down at a table, in a room with a gentle crackling fire, and brings him golden flower tea and a slice of pie.

The pie is _incredible_. It's the most delicious thing he's ever eaten. Its substance melts into the magic of his body as smoothly as if it knows it belongs there, and he can feel its restorative energy flooding through him instantly, warming him like the glow of the fire. Food like this probably deserves to be savored slowly, but he can't stop himself from shoveling it in, anyway.

Toriel looks pleased. "Do you like it?"

He nods, and swallows the final mouthful. "It's _amazing_." To illustrate his satisfaction, he leans back and lets out a theatrical – and physiologically unnecessary – burp.

She gives him a mock-disapproving look, but he winks at her, and the expression dissolves back into a smile. "Well," she says, "I am glad." Then, almost shyly, "I gave you this recipe once. Do you remember?"

"Oh, yeah," he says. "I tried making it."

"You did? You never said!"

"Well, it was kind of embarrassing." Sans picks up his teacup and turns it over in his hands. "It didn't exactly come out well. I tried to get my brother to eat some, but he couldn't even figure out what it was supposed to be. Kept calling it a 'sweet quiche.' I'm still not entirely sure what I did wrong. I figure I'm not really cut out to be a chef."

Toriel makes a tsking sound. "Now, I am sure that is not true! Anyone can learn to make a pie. I can teach you, if you like."

"Yeah, I'd like that," he says. It certainly sounds like a better way of passing the time than lying in bed with his eyes open all day. 

"I am sure that we will soon have you baking pies that your brother will think truly _take the cake_!"

She laughs at her own joke. Sans... can't bring himself to try.

"Oh dear," she says, whatever expression he's let creep onto his face wiping the amusement off of hers. "Did I say something wrong?"

Well. It was bound to come up sooner or later. "No," he says. "It's just, my brother's..." He shifts uneasily in his chair. Just say it, Sans. "My brother's gone."

"Oh." He can see thoughts spinning behind her eyes, making connections she probably doesn't want to make. She knows the kid's killed people. He probably can't blame her if she didn't have time to ask who. " _Oh._ I'm– "

He cuts her off before she can say "sorry" again. He's had enough of that. "It's okay," he says. "It's okay. He'll be back, eventually."

"Oh," she says again, in a different tone, relieved and puzzled. "Well, then. When he returns, we can make him pie." 

It's a nice thought. And who knows, maybe it'll happen. Maybe in the next temporal loop, he and Toriel and Papyrus will all eat pie together. For all he knows, maybe it's already happened. Maybe there are an infinite number of timelines that feature more pie and less senseless murder than this one. "Yeah, that'd be nice," he says. "For right now, though..." He gives her a look that comes as close as he can manage to the one the annoying dog uses to beg for bones. "Do you think I could have another piece?" 

"Of course!" She leaps up from her chair. "I really am so glad you like it. It... it is nice to have someone to share it with, you know." She touches his hand, just for a moment. "I am glad you talked me into opening the door."

She bustles off into the kitchen before he can respond. Which is probably a good thing, because suddenly he's caught between a desire to hug her again and a desire to put his head down on the table and cry.

When she comes back, he makes his perpetually grinning face smile a little wider and, before she can say anything else, he asks her an innocuous question about pie crust.

It's easy to get her talking about cooking. Then about snails, about life in the ruins, about Froggits and Whimsuns and spiders. In return, he tells her a little about Snowdin, about the library, Grillby's – the places she passed by without stopping in her hurry to return to her exile. They talk about books. They make some really high-quality bad puns.

They don't talk about his brother again, or about humans, or the barrier. So, all-in-all, he considers it a pretty successful conversation.

**

After a while, though, he starts to get tired, his eye sockets trying to squeeze themselves closed even though he's genuinely interested in what she's saying. Maybe that shouldn't really surprise him. This is undoubtedly the most interaction he's had with anyone since his brother's constant presence was suddenly no longer constantly present.

It's funny. Toriel's soft, precise tones are nothing at all like Papyrus's lack-of-an-indoor-voice voice, but there's something soothing about it, anyway. Something, maybe, that makes him feel that if he closes his eyes right now and wakes up still here tomorrow, it might not be all bad, because at least he'll still have someone cool to talk to while he waits for this iteration of the world to end. It's weirdly comforting.

"Oh, my goodness!" Toriel exclaims. "I am sorry, Sans. I did not realize it had gotten so late."

Sans opens his eyes, realizing he'd half-slipped into another dream. Something about sunlight on the surface, he thinks, but it's fading fast. "It has?" he says. He has no idea how long they've actually been sitting here. It seems he's completely lost track of time. Well, that's probably a good thing. Might be nice to do that more often.

"You should have said you were getting tired," she continues. "Here I have kept you awake, chattering on all night like the silly old woman I am." There's a trace of awkward self-consciousness to her now that was completely missing while she enthused to him about snail facts and pie fillings. He can't quite decide whether it's sort of cute, or just a bit sad.

"You're not a silly old woman, Tori," he says. He's not sure at what point during the evening he started calling her that, but she hasn't objected yet. "It's been nice. Like I said, I kinda needed a friend."

"I suppose we all do, sometimes," she says, and something about the look in her eyes makes him wonder just how long she's spent down here alone.

"Yeah," he says.

"But I will not keep you longer," she says. "You look as if you are about to fall asleep where you sit."

"Yeah," he says again. "I do that. I'm a real– "

"– lazybones," they finish together, and the self-consciousness he saw a moment ago is suddenly gone.

"Well," she says, "if it is time for you to leave, I will wrap up another piece of pie for you to take with you. Or..." She looks thoughtful for a moment. "Or, if you are too tired to make it home, I have a spare room? The bed is very small, but I do not think that will be a problem for you." She laughs, but the sound isn't unkind. Pretty much the opposite, really.

He's not too tired to get home. He could have been there before she finished making her offer, if he wanted. "That'd be great," he says. "Thanks, Tori."

She beams. "Not at all! I will look forward to letting you decide whether my breakfasts are as good as my pies."

"I don't doubt it," he says, and something in him relaxes a little, even if he's not at all sure what it is.

"Come, then. I will show you."

**

It's a kid's room. There's a toy box, a collection of kids' shoes, a wardrobe that he's willing to bet is full of striped shirts.

He glances into the shoe box, wonders how many different kids' feet the shoes are sized for. But he knows the answer, doesn't he? Seven. It's got to be seven.

"Yes," she says, as though answering a question he hasn't asked. "This is where the children sleep. Slept. There are none right now, of course."

Her voice is even, but the look on her face... It's a little funny, how easy it is to read, all covered in fur like that. But all faces are easy to read, when you're used to practicing on a skull.

"You loved them," he says. And then, unable to stop himself. "All of 'em."

"They were my children," she says, softly.

He looks at her for a moment, at the sad, distant look in her eyes, then drops his gaze down to the floor. Yeah. Yeah, he's definitely never going to tell her what happened to Papyrus.

"Well," she says. He looks up again at the sound of her voice, can see her putting on cheerfulness like it's Temmie armor. "If you do not need anything else?"

"Nah," he says. "Thanks, Tori."

"You are welcome."

"I mean it. Thanks for everything."

"You are welcome," she repeats, firmly, and he knows she means it, too. "I will let you get some sleep now."

She touches his shoulder gently as she leaves the room, and a moment later he hears the sound of the door clicking shut behind him.

He stares at the bed.

Sans really does pride himself on his ability to sleep anywhere. He's slept on chairs and tables. He's slept standing up, and face down in the snow. Once, he fell asleep on top of a Hotland steam vent.

He is _not_ sleeping in his brother's murderer's bed.

He waits, patiently, until the sounds of Toriel clearing up the dishes fade away, until he hears the door of the room next to his quietly open and shut. He waits until he's pretty sure that even someone far less good at it than him ought to have finally fallen asleep.

Then he takes a shortcut back to the living room and curls up in Toriel's armchair. It's surprisingly comfortable and warm.

**

He opens his eyes. Still here.

But the chair is still comfy, and there's an unfamiliar but delicious smell wafting in from the kitchen, so, hey, it could be worse.

Could be better, of course. But could be a lot worse.

"Sans! You are awake." Toriel's face hovers over him. It's sort of upside-down, since, somewhere in the night, he ended up with his head dangling down the front of the chair. He should probably sit up, but he's too comfortable to move. One of the advantages of being a skeleton is that he doesn't have any muscles to cramp.

"Uh, yeah. Morning. Hey, something smells really good."

"Why are you sleeping on the chair? Was there something wrong with the bed?"

"Uh, no." He re-thinks this answer, and pulls himself up into a normal sitting position, after all. (Well, a slouchy sitting position, aka normal for him.) "Well, it was a little... I dunno. A little lumpy."

"Oh, no! Sans, I am sorry. I did not realize." She looks genuinely dismayed, and he feels an unpleasant stab of guilt.

"Not your fault. Hell, it's nothing, really. A human probably wouldn't even feel it. You know. Padding. But, uh." He taps himself on the femur. "I'm all skin and bones, only without the skin, so I'm probably more sensitive."

If his recent sleeping position makes her skeptical of this claim, she does a good job not showing it. "I wish you had said something."

"Didn't wanna wake you. The chair was fine. It's a great chair. I could sleep in it all day." In illustration, he leans back, closes his eyes for a moment, and pretends to doze off again. "See?"

"No, no, I cannot have you sleeping in a chair." She hesitates for a moment, then, slowly, as if coming to a difficult decision, says, "I do have another room. It will need cleaning, but I am certain the bed in there will be more comfortable. Perhaps next time you can use that."

He's pretty sure he can guess what room that is. He feels startled, and oddly touched. "Oh, gosh, Tori..."

Her hand flies up to cover her mouth, and she gasps a little, as if suddenly realizing what she's just implied. "Oh! I am sorry. I don't mean to presume! It's just... If you wanted to stay again, sometime, or..."

Impulsively, he reaches out and grabs her other hand. "Yeah, I'd like that."

And that is how he comes to spend his nights in King Asgore's old bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LittleKnownArtist, aka Miyori999, has done a really awesome comics adaptation of this chapter! Check it out [starting here](http://miyori999.deviantart.com/art/While-We-Wait-1-8-692784780). I cannot say how utterly delighted I am to have inspired it.


	2. PART II: Olive Who?

**PART II: Olive Who?**

He goes back to Snowdin occasionally after that, but never to stay.

The first time, it's to pick up a few things from his house. He doesn't need much: A few almost-clean socks. His pet rock, which he guesses he's going to actually have to feed now. A picture from his workshop in the basement, just because he likes to have it around.

He stands for a long time in his brother's room, wondering if he should take anything of Papyrus's with him as a remembrance. But what would be the point? It's not like he's going to forget. Instead he takes the crumpled red cloth he's been carrying around in his pocket, folds it more carefully than his brother probably would have believed him capable of, and leaves it on the bed, as if it's merely waiting its owner's return.

Which is dumb. Papyrus isn't coming back to this room. He'll just... never have been gone from it. But it makes him feel better, anyway.

He thinks after that he might just stay in the Ruins for however long things last, but one glance at Toriel's worn, exhausted bookshelves sends him back for a trip to the library, and the look of sheer joy on her face when he hands her a stack of books she's never seen before is enough to send him back repeatedly.

And once in a while, out of sheer nostalgia for bad, greasy food, he stops by Grillby's and answers everyone's questions about where he's been. "Out in the forest looking for humans," he says. "There's nobody left to fire me, and you know how seriously I take my job." Or, "I jumped into the Abyss. Got a house down there now. It's pretty nice, but sometimes it makes me feel a little down in the dumps." Or, "Got a job working on a top-secret project in a laboratory in Hotland." (They find that one funnier than they should.) Or, "I'm living in the Ruins with the queen. She makes terrific pies." Eventually they stop expecting him to give them a serious answer.

Toriel never comes with him. He really can't blame her.

**

One after another, the days come and go, come and go. Every day he wakes up and discovers that he's still _this_ Sans. Every day, he's a little more grateful that he doesn't have to wait alone.

He can tell Toriel feels the same, even if she doesn't know what it is she's waiting for. She's so eager to show him everything in her world. It almost reminds him of Papyrus and his puzzles, but there's something hesitant and fragile in it, as if she's expecting that at any moment he'll decide it's not enough for him and disappear on her, leaving her alone again with the uncomprehending Froggits and fleeing Whimsuns. She's constantly bracing herself for things to end.

He can't tell her that they won't, and can't really explain to her why this version of her won't be around to care when they do. He figures, the best thing he can do to show her he's planning on staying is to stay. 

And staying with her is... He hesitates to use to the word, almost doesn't want to admit he can still use it about anything at all, but it's _fun_. She lobs terrible jokes back and forth with him, giving as good as she gets, and if there's a different kind of pleasure in it than there was in driving his brother crazy, it's a _good_ kind. It's two like minds striking against each other and giving off punny little sparks.

He enjoys going bug-hunting with her, too, sprawling on a bed of leaves and watching as she swings her net with surprising speed and power, her muzzle scrunched up in an almost comical expression of concentration. Sometimes when she misses badly, she swears, then blushes and apologizes, then apologizes again for apologizing to him as if he were a child. It's kind of hilarious. Plus, then she always makes crunchy cricket cookies, which are _way_ better than they sound. He even does the dishes afterward, because her staying quiet about doing all the work makes him somehow feel guiltier about it than Papyrus's constant yelling ever did. But he doesn't really mind very much. At least he can reach her sink, even if he does need a stool.

In the evenings they sit together in front of the just-warm-enough fire, she in her usual chair, he in one just as comfortable as hers but more him-sized, that she scavenged for him somewhere in the ruins. She reads his new books, and he reads her old ones. Sometimes they read snippets out to each other. She usually has something smart or funny to say about hers.

It's nice. Despite all the other, sadder things it is, it's nice. 

The days continue to pass, and he tries not to count them as they go.

**

It's the pie-making that changes everything, although it takes him a while to realize it.

Honestly, he's not even all that interested in learning to bake any more. It's not like he's going to go back to Snowdin and do it for himself, and Toriel enjoys it too much for it to be a chore he can relieve her of. But she likes the idea of teaching him, and he likes that she likes it. So.

The first time, she simply invites him to watch her as she goes through the steps. "Fine by me," he says. "Watching other people do all the work is one of my favorite things."

He's kidding, of course. Watching other people work is usually almost as boring as doing work himself, and he'd much rather take a nap. But watching Tori make a pie turns out to be oddly enthralling. Her hands dance across the counters, doing things with butter and cinnamon and sugar that seem as though they must be magic, but aren't. And as she works, she explains each action with a combination of scientific precision and puns, which may be his favorite combination of things ever. When she's done, he feels as if he understands a little more about the universe, or at least about the part of it that goes into pie.

When it's finally baking in the oven, under an impressively self-sustaining bit of fire magic, she immediately starts cleaning up. Or tries to, at least. 

"Sans," she says. "Would you be kind enough to hand me the flour?"

"'Course I will, Tori. No need to use such _flour_ -y language to ask." 

He stops, mid-chuckle, with his hand on the bag. Something about those words is niggling in the back of his mind. Flowery? Flower? It triggers something. A vague memory, a remnant of a dream. 

He's used to paying attention to such feelings. Sometimes they tell him things he really needs to know. He gives it a moment, waits to see if it connects to anything. But nothing comes to him. The only flowers he's seen here have been boring, ordinary ones, not even echo flowers. Whatever it might have meant, a universe or twenty ago, it doesn't feel relevant now.

"Sans?"

"Oh, sure, Tori. Here you go." He tosses the bag of flour upwards and catches it with magic, intending to float it gently into her hands. Showing off to distract her from his distraction.

But she misunderstands, thinking, maybe, that it's about to splat against the ceiling. She lunges for it, gasping, grabbing at it just as he starts to push it in her direction. Strong boss monster hands clutch at the flimsy bag, and clawed boss monster fingers dig into its sides with far more force than she must have intended.

Flour erupts everywhere, falling like snow onto Tori's fur, over Tori's apron and dress.

"Oh, shit! Sorry! Sorry!" He leaps down from his stool, rushes towards her, and beats his hands frantically against her flour-coated clothing. It doesn't seem to be helping much.

"Sans." She sounds utterly befuddled. "What are you _doing_?"

"Sorry," he says again, combing his fingers through the floury fur on the backs on her hands and sending little puffs of white into the air. "Just tryin' to de-flour you."

There's another gasp, entirely different from the one that accompanied her grab for the flour bag, and then a very loud silence.

Sans' mind, still a little muddled from exploding bags and half-formed memories, takes a moment to play back what he just said. He freezes. "Oh, geez. Oh, no, I didn't..."

Toriel begins to laugh. She has an amazing laugh, half giggle, half snort, but he's not really in a state to appreciate it just now. "I am afraid you are a little late for that!"

"Oh, man." Sans clutches his skull with both hands and lowers himself slowly to the kitchen floor. "Oh, man. Believe it or not, that is the one time I wasn't actually _trying_ to make a pun."

This just makes her laugh harder until, apparently unable to hold herself upright, she sinks onto the floor next to him, wiping at her eyes. 

There they sit, making butt-prints in the flour, until she regains her ability to breathe and he regains his... Well, it'd probably be too much to say "dignity," but at least his ability to look her in the eye.

And if she looks back at him in a slightly new way, underneath the merriment, as if perhaps he's put an interesting thought into her head, he figures it's just her finally understanding exactly how big a dork he is. 

**

The next time, they make the pie together. She guides his hands on the rolling pin, steps in to correct him before he makes a terrible mistake with the butter, smiles with tolerant amusement at the slight lopsidedness of his crust.

When it comes out of the oven, fragrant and warm, she puts her arm around him, and they spend a quiet moment just looking down at this thing they've made together. "Beautiful," she says.

"Yeah." It is sort of beautiful, even if the crust maybe isn't quite a perfect circle. (There's a math joke in there somewhere, he thinks, maybe with a bonus radius-and-ulna pun, but he can't quite manage to get to it.)

"I knew you could learn," she says. "I believe you may have a future as a baker!"

He shrugs. "Dunno about the future," he says. "But it doesn't look bad."

It tastes pretty good, too. Like naughty children, they eat it for dinner, then follow it with more for dessert.

**

Finally, she declares him ready to solo. He measures and whisks, melts and rolls, as she stands behind him, offering advice but no interference. She's so pleased by his progress that he almost can't help putting his best effort into it, and he discovers that it feels oddly good doing something with care and attention again, even if it's something whose result won't last longer than the time it takes to eat. Maybe especially because of that.

It comes out looking right this time, too. A textbook Toriel butterscotch-cinnamon pie. 

She seems almost more proud of it than he is, which, he has to admit, is saying something. "I do not believe I could have done better!" she says, setting it onto the counter to cool. "You are an excellent student, Sans. Now we can take turns making it for each other!"

"Sure," he says. He hops up onto the stool he's been using for easy access to the counter tops and gives it a closer, critical eye. Yeah. Yeah, that is one very fine-looking pie. "And, hey, I had a pretty good teacher. You could say you _pie_ -oneered the way for me."

She laughs that rich, earthy laugh of hers, and hugs him. She feels warm and solid, and smells of cinnamon. Or maybe that's him. "I am proud of you," she says. And then, unexpectedly, "I am glad you are here."

"Dunno where else I would be, if we're making pie. Kitchen's kind of the traditional place for it." Well, he can't really say he's glad either of them are here, can he, given the circumstances? Even if, just now, he maybe kind of is. He hugs her back, instead, as she laughs again. He can feel her whole body vibrating against his ribs, her amusement rumbling through both of them. 

She gives him a little extra squeeze, then pulls back from the hug, her fingers still lingering on his scapulae, and smiles at him. With him standing on the stool, they're face-to-face.

He really is good at reading expressions, at least when he's not mortally embarrassed and covered in flour. And that look on her face... It startles him so much, he almost loses his balance. There's something warm and shy in it, something wistful and longing. And very much focused on _him_.

Oh, he thinks, and suddenly remembers another baking lesson, another, different look. _Oh._

And then, he thinks a great many things, very quickly.

He thinks: _Me?_ She's looking that way at _me_?

He thinks about the feeling of soft fur against his bones, about what it would be like to run her silky ear through his fingers, to press his face against her neck. He thinks about her soul, deep inside her – a brief, unbidden dirty thought – and feels his own soul quiver in response.

He thinks: Well, why not? No, really, _why not_? Enjoy whatever you have in this life while it lasts, hasn't that been his motto? Why shouldn't they enjoy it together?

He thinks, maybe if they have something, maybe if they _are_ something, maybe if she feels something for him... Maybe that won't be lost. Maybe it will echo. Maybe, next time, when the next Sans comes knocking, she'll feel some sense of deja vu, something that tells her he belongs, and she'll open the door, right at the beginning. Maybe that Sans can have his better world, and not have to lose one person he cares about to find another. (Maybe, some tiny treacherous voice inside him says, that Sans might find the human before she does, and he might never have to lose them at all. But he tries not to listen to that.)

He thinks: I _care_ about this woman. I care about her a _lot_. I want to– 

She ducks her head and begins to pull away. The expression from a moment ago is gone. She only looks confused by his silence.

He grips her shoulder with one almost-trembling hand, and lifts the other to gently touch her face. "Hey," he says, his voice as soft and low as he can make it.

"S– Sans? What are you doing?" She's trying to sound light, playful, but her voice is almost trembling, too.

He caresses her cheek, the tips of his phalanges making gentle circles in her fur. "Uh, do you want me to stop?"

She seems to not quite be able to speak, but shakes her head slightly side-to-side, an eloquent non-verbal "no." 

He lets his finger touch the corner of her mouth. Lips, fur, flesh... She's so fascinatingly _different_ from him.

She parts her mouth, turns slightly towards his hand, and for a moment her lips close around his finger. They are gentle, and wet, and warm. "Oh," he says. "Uh, _wow._ "

But she steps back from him with an almost convulsive movement, her hands flying up to cover her muzzle. She laughs, a high, embarrassed sound he's never heard from her before. "Oh! Oh, I cannot. That, is, you– " She draws a deep breath. "Sans. I care for you very much, and I am very flattered, but you do not have to... That is, you know you are welcome here, and if I have not..." Her hands entwine and twist in front of her. "Well, it seems I have not successfully concealed my, er, my _interest_. But I do not expect anything of you, truly! Other than your friendship, of course. I know that I am a very silly old woman, and you are quite a charming young– "

"Hey!' A surge of annoyance competes inside him with a rush of giddiness at the idea that she finds him _charming_ , and the annoyance somehow wins out. "Stop calling yourself that, OK? Just... don't. You're not a silly old woman, geez. You're the woman who fireballed a Loox that was trying to pick on me the other day. Which was pretty hot, by the way, and I'm not just sayin' that because it's a pun."

She opens her mouth, starts to say something that sounds like a protest, but he cuts her off.

"Silly old woman! You're a _queen_. Even if you did give it up. Everybody knows you kept the kingdom going at least as much as Asgore did, back in the day. Not to mention, you're a really great cook, and all I can do is make one kind of pie. If anybody's out of anybody's league here, it definitely ain't me."

Her eyes are huge and liquid, as if something that has been dammed up behind them for a very long time is finally melting. He simultaneously feels good about putting that look in her eyes, and angry at the world that someone needed to.

"Plus," he says, "I don't like anybody talking that way about people I care about."

"Thank you," she says, quietly. 

He holds out his arms, silently inviting. She hesitates, and for a moment he thinks he's wrong, after all, that she's not going to move. And then, all at once, his arms are full of her, and she's nuzzling against his vertebrae and laughing with joy, and just for the moment, things are very much all right.

Plus, later there will be pie.

**

The physical part of lovemaking is a little awkward, the first time. They're so differently shaped, so differently sized, so differently _everything_. It's hard to know where to put their limbs, where a touch will be exciting and where it just feels ridiculous. A few times, they almost break down giggling so hard they can't continue. But it's _fun_. And before very long, they've learned that he likes the feeling of fur tickling the intimate spaces between his ribs, that she loves the slide of bone against the tips of her (fascinatingly fleshy) breasts, that they both like it when she sucks his fingers in between her parted lips.

The other, deeper parts of lovemaking are something else, entirely. Her magic caresses his soul, plays across its surface like dancing flames. His wraps around hers like a blanket and showers across it like a blast of energy as she gasps and calls his name.

Somewhere in the middle of it all, he realizes that, for the first time since the human did what the human did, he is hoping for this timeline to last the night.

And then he stops thinking about the timelines at all.

**

He wakes the next morning with an extra-big grin on his face that feels like it's been there all night. Toriel is already gone, but that's not very surprising. She's an early riser and he, well, _isn't_. 

He stretches lazily, slides down out of her bed, and throws on his clothes. It's funny. Neither of them got much sleep last night, but he feels better rested than he has in ages. His bones feel... light.

He finds her sitting at the table with a teacup in front of her. "Hey, T– " he begins, but his cheerful greeting changes to a question as he sees the look on her face. Has she been crying? "Tori?"

She looks over at him, startled, and wipes a hand across her eyes. "Oh, Sans! You are awake. Hello!"

He walks towards her, his steps a little heavier now. "What's wrong?" Did he hurt her, somehow? The thought seems almost laughable; it was she who had to be careful of _him_. But... "Did I do something?" 

"Oh!" she says. "Oh, no. You did not. I am crying because I am happy." She smiles at him, and it is a real, honest smile, one that reveals a flash of her cute little fangs. But there is a distracted look in her eyes, and she clearly sees that he can see it. "Only," she says, hesitantly, "I am happy in a sad way, perhaps. Does that make sense?" She picks up the teacup and turns it restlessly in her hands.

"Uh, maybe?" He rests a hand tentatively on her arm. Her hands go still around the cup for a moment, then she sets it down again.

"Loneliness is such a strange thing," she says. "You do not realize how lonely you truly are until you stop. At least, I do not."

"Oh," he says, softly.

"I have been thinking about many things," she says. "I was just thinking about Asgore." She laughs a little, almost nervously. "I am sorry." She covers his hand, still resting on her arm, with her own. "It is very rude to bring up one's ex with a new lover, I am sure."

"Nah, it's okay." He shrugs a little. "I liked the guy." 

"I came to hate him. But before that..." She strokes his hand a little. He's not sure if she realizes she's doing it. "I thought what we had would last forever. But then it did not, and I was alone. Except for the children. Every time one came to me I thought, 'This time, it will be different.' But it was not. And this morning, I was sitting here again, thinking, 'It is so good not to be alone.'" Her hand clutches at his.

"I get it," he says. "I understand."

She tilts her head towards him and blinks away the traces of tears in her eyes. "Do you?"

"Maybe not the details, everything you've lived through. But feeling like you've got something great, and wantin' to cry sometimes because you've learned that nothing actually lasts? Yeah. I get that." Her expression is gently curious now, and he has to look away. "Not stuff I really want to talk about."

If she asks, though? If what she needs from him is that particular kind of honesty? He's afraid he might tell her. He's really afraid he might.

But instead she just hugs him, and he feels the tension that's been building inside him ease.

He loves this woman.

He takes her hands in his as she releases him from the hug. "But you don't have to worry," he says. "I'm here for the duration. I promise."

The smile she gives him is so bright it's like the Underground has suddenly acquired a sun.

"So," he says, smiling back at her, deliberately making his voice casual again. "What you said before. Is that what I am now? Your, uh, lover?"

"Well, of course you are! If that is what you wish to be."

"I think that would be _lover_ -ly," he says.

And that's how he stops sleeping in Asgore's old bed. Because, unlike the King, he is easily small enough to fit in hers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check out [this amazing comic version of the "de-flouring" scene](http://poisondilu.tumblr.com/post/164695153351/sorielweek-2017-day-1-trust-weeks-late-but-i) by Poisond!


	3. PART III: Hi, Unexpected!  I'm Dad.

**PART III: Hi, Unexpected! I'm Dad.**

Time continues to pass, one tick of the clock following another, linear and unbroken, month after month. Except that, for Sans, it seems to be passing faster now. In his experience, time flies when you're having pun, but it flies even faster when you're having other things, as well.

And as it passes, his soul and Toriel's grow steadily closer. 

This isn't a metaphor, or, at least, it's not _only_ a metaphor. Their lovemaking slides naturally, happily, along the path of increasing intimacy, their souls approaching each other a little nearer each time until at last their surfaces touch, and the magic swirling around them is no longer his or hers, but _theirs_ , indistinguishable and intertwined. An ancient, traditional progression, from the first expression of new-found love or lust, to something that, if they wished, they could describe to the rest of the world as a marriage. If the rest of the world was something they cared about at all.

**

But there is, of course, one further stage of intimacy.

It happens like this: They are lying pressed close against each other, his hands tangled in her fur, hers among his ribs, but they have long since stopped paying much attention to their bodies. Her soul pulses against his like the heart he's never had, each movement sending waves of pleasure through him and causing his own soul to shudder and tremble in response. Toriel cries out softly at the sensations that trembling feeds back into her, sensations he can almost feel with her, as her soul almost, but not quite, becomes part of his.

"Sans," she says, her breathless voice a paradoxical mixture of eager and hesitant. "May I...?" Her soul moves against his in a new way, with a sort of intent and forceful pressure, just for a moment. "Would you like me to...?"

He's not feeling particularly good with words at the moment, himself, but he knows exactly what she's asking. It's not like he hasn't thought about it. Hasn't wondered what it would be like, whether it's something she might want to do. And he can't think of a single reason not to, given that the usual consequences aren't exactly going to apply. Given how utterly he adores her.

So he says, "Oh, _hell_ , yes. Please!"

It comes out sounding almost pathetically desperate, and she laughs. God, he loves making her laugh in bed, even if he hadn't exactly intended to just then. "So eager, my love," she says, and it's amazing that anyone could have that much warmth and happiness and arousal in their voice, just because of _him_. 

For a moment, he's brought back to his body by the feeling of nuzzling kisses against his skull, and then that awareness disappears again, subsumed under a brighter, stronger sensation.

Her magic kneads against him in a new and deeper way, sending constant shocks of pleasure through him, until the surface of his being softens, and expands and opens to her.

She pushes her soul into his. Their edges overlap and blend, until they are one, they are SansToriel, and they are doing something _absolutely amazing_.

It doesn't last long, but it doesn't need to. It's a moment that completely suspends all sense of time, a moment of pleasure more intense than any he's experienced in his life. Or, he'd be willing to bet, in any other life he's ever had.

They both cry out, and by the time they've finished, they are two people again.

Two _extremely_ satisfied people.

" _Wow_ ," he manages to say, after a while.

She nods her head and makes some incoherent happy noises, like little bleating whimpers. And that's fine. Words really don't seem necessary right now.

His soul aches a little, but in a good way. The best possible way. They've got to do that again sometime, he thinks. Not right away. It's a little too overwhelming to be an everyday activity. But they've _really_ got to do that again.

 _I'll say that to her in the morning_ , he decides, as she cuddles him close and they both drift off into exhausted sleep.

**

He wakes long before the morning, with a strange, persistent feeling that something's... wrong? No, not wrong, not really, but something's different. Something's... _weird._

He can't quite pin it down. Is it a feeling in his body, his magic, his soul? Is it everywhere at once? He shifts a little, trying to figure it out, moving gently underneath the arm Toriel has draped over him. Her fingers brush against... _something_. Something he can feel, but not identify.

OK. This is starting to freak him out a little.

Slowly, quietly, he disentangles himself from Toriel's embrace. She stirs slightly but doesn't wake, and the memory of what they did together to tire her out so much brings him both a thrill of pleasure and an odd little stab of trepidation.

He exits the bedroom as silently as he can, shuts the door carefully behind him, turns on the light in the hall, and looks down at himself.

There's more of him than there was yesterday.

Translucent, blue-tinged magic fills the formerly empty space between his lower ribs and his pelvis. Hesitantly, he reaches around behind him and finds it wrapped around and anchored to his spine. When he touches it, it gives a little. And when it springs back into shape, he catches a glimpse of something inside. Something bright, and white, and shaped like a soul.

He forces himself to go to the mirror, to look into it.

Yep. Yep, that's a pregnant skeleton, all right. So much for lack of consequences.

His eyes go dark. He stares into them for a long time, thinking nothing.

Then he goes into his old room, pulls a blanket off the bed, wraps it around himself, and sits in his chair in the living room, trying to decide what to think. But somehow, all that comes into his mind, over and over, is the thought of how overjoyed Papyrus would be. Sans can actually _hear_ his laugh, his over-excited squeals. The pounding of his feet as he runs through the street, mortally embarrassing his brother by screaming out to everyone he meets that he's about to be an uncle.

Sans rests his hands atop the blanket, against his unfamiliar new abdomen. "It's a damn shame, kid," he says, quietly, "That the two of you are never going to exist at the same time."

**

When Toriel finds him there in the morning, she looks more than a little confused. Understandably, he has to admit. He's never awake before her, and it's got to be even more surprising to find him sitting silently in the living room, naked underneath a blanket.

"Sans?" She's smiling at him, however uncertainly, but whatever expression she sees on his face makes it falter. "Goodness, Sans, is something wrong?"

He laughs a little, but there's not a lot of humor in it. "You know, I've been sitting here trying to figure out the answer to that, myself."

She comes to him, looking downright worried now, and puts a hand on his shoulder. It feels good. He gives in to the impulse to rest his cheek against her arm for a moment.

Then he sighs. "I've, uh. I've got something I need you to know about, and I'm really not sure how to say it, so I think I'm just gonna have to show you."

She lowers her hand, takes a step back, and tilts her head at him quizzically. "Whatever it is," she says, "You do not need to feel embarrassed to show me."

Embarrassed? Is that how he looks? Yeah, maybe it is. "OK, then," he says. "Here goes." He unwraps the blanket.

For a second, she's not even certain what she's looking at, he can tell. He watches understanding dawn in her eyes, and when it does, she lets out a gasp, her hand flying up to cover her mouth.

Utterly, completely shocked. Well, that answers one question, anyway. He didn't _think_ she'd be likely to regard one half-articulated question gasped out during sex as an adequate conversation about choosing parenthood. But, then, it might be understandable if Tori were a little weird on the subject of kids.

"Sans, are you...?"

"No longer a sole soul?" he says. "Yeah. Seems like last night we had too much fun for two people and ended up making another one."

He watches her hand clutch convulsively at her mouth, watches her force it down and back to her side. "I... I do not know what to say. This is such a shock. I am afraid I made a very foolish assumption. I thought because you called yourself 'he,' that you would not be... capable."

"Oh." He pulls the blanket around him a little, but doesn't cover up his midsection. "Uh, yeah, gender in skeletons doesn't really mean much, y'know? It's usually a little bit about bone structure and a lot about personal preference." He shrugs. "We work the same as ghosts, though, basically. Don't ask me why they usually use 'they' and we like to say 'he' and 'she,' though. Tradition, I guess."

"I am sorry. I do not believe I have ever met any skeletons before." She looks genuinely upset. At the mistake, he thinks. He's still not sure how she feels about the results.

"'Sokay. I mean, it turns out I don't know as much about boss monsters as I thought I did, either. I thought you could only, well, have kids with each other. Because of the immortality magic."

She slowly sits down on her chair, facing him. Probably deciding this is going to be a long conversation. "We cannot bear children to other kinds of monsters," she says. "The women cannot, I mean. Men usually cannot bear children at all, only father them. But, although we do not do it often, other monsters can bear ours."

"Yeah," he says, gesturing down at himself. "Kinda noticed."

That actually gets a little smile out of her. "Those children are not boss monsters, though," she says. "They do not receive the... the immortality magic. Our– " She stops herself for a moment, as if startled by the thought of the word she has just said, then swallows and continues, in a quieter voice. "Our child will not."

Not that it probably matters, one way or another. "Our kid," he says, trying out the phrase. He is unprepared for the turbulent jumble of emotion it evokes in him. Rather than trying to sort that particular mental mess out, he says, "Are you... okay with this? I mean, obviously it's going to happen one way or another, but... Well, I'd understand if you're not okay."

She rises and comes to him again, squatting down beside his chair and taking her hand in his. "Of course I am," she says, squeezing tightly. "I love children, Sans. My life has always felt poorer without them. And I love _you_. And..." He can see tears building in her eyes.

He squeezes back. "And?" he says softly.

"And," she says, wiping at the tears with the hand not currently holding his, "I cannot say how very, very much I would like the chance to raise one child who will have the chance to grow up."

He can't promise her that. He can't.

She clearly sees something in his face, some flicker of despair. "You do not want this," she says quietly. "You do not wish to be a parent."

"It's not that," he says. His mind fills with thoughts of Papyrus, as a child, as an adult. Papryus opening a birthday gift or sitting wide-eyed and rapt as his older brother read him a story. Toddler Papyrus falling hilariously on his tailbone and immediately getting up again, refusing to believe that he could fail at this strange new thing called "walking." The absolute, unconditional love that had always been there, underneath all their teasing. "I like kids," he says, proud that he manages not to sound _entirely_ choked up. "Kids are fun. Having some of my own... It's a nice idea." "Nice" is hardly the word for the aching longing he suddenly feels, but he's got nothing else, so it's going to have to do. "It's just..." He tries to shrug again, but it comes out more like a shiver. "I can't quite bring myself to believe it's actually going to happen. I guess."

"Well, it has all come as such a surprise!," she says. She puts her arms around him and hugs him close, her furry cheek brushing softly against his skull. "Give it time, my love. Just give it a little time."

**

He gives it time. Or takes the time that's given to him, anyway; it's not like he has a choice in the matter.

He's not sure exactly how long he has. Skeleton pregnancies are shorter than most monsters'. There's not exactly a lot of physical body for the magic to make. Normally, it might be four months, give or take. He figures Tori's contribution might make it a little more, even if the kid's physical form is going to be mostly patterned after his. He's no expert on the subject, but he's pretty sure that's how it usually works.

In the meantime, he goes to bed every night with a child inside him, and wakes up every morning strangely astonished to discover it still there.

The _really_ strange thing is, being pregnant is actually kind of nice. Yeah, it feels weird to have this whole new part of him, and to no longer be able to reach inside himself and scratch his spine from the front. But not weird in a bad way, except occasionally when his spine really itches.

Otherwise, the only physical effects are that he feels hungrier and sleepier, as the growing kidlet leaches his magical resources, but since eating and sleeping are two of his all-time favorite things, he doesn't really mind that much. Plus, gestating is an excellent excuse for laziness. Hell, even if he _tries_ to help Tori as she runs around building cribs – plural, since the first one she attempted didn't meet her exacting standards – and making sure all the fireplace tools are properly blunted for safety, she just yells at him to sit down and _preg_ -occupy himself with making their baby instead. It's a pretty sweet deal.

And he likes it when she gently lays her hand against the magic that holds their child and smiles, likes the tender look on her face when she tells him that she is glad to be doing this with him. He likes the endlessly inventive stream of "mom" and "dad" puns she keeps coming out with. (And he doesn't care that she uses those words backwards. They can do that the boss monster way instead of the skeleton one. After all, she's used to being "mom," and "mom" and "dad" both seem equally strange to him.) 

He likes how _happy_ she is. Even if this never goes anywhere, if the timeline doesn't last to the end of his pregnancy, he's glad he could give her this. Seeing her so full of hope and energy and excitement can't help but make him smile. She's enjoying the moment she has. It's absolutely the best thing to do, and, through her, he tries to enjoy it, too.

But every day he finds himself hoping a little harder that they won't exist long enough to see it end. Because he's also growing to love the thought of this kid. The _reality_ of this kid. The indistinct glimpses of soul or of developing bone he sometimes catches inside him, when the light hits the magic just right. The tiny movements he can feel them making, more and more often now, which always make him wonder what they might look like moving _outside_ him, and remembering babybones Papyrus's adorable bumbling crawl.

Happiness and hope, those things come and go. But he can't shake the feeling that every other Sans is going to carry a gaping, inexplicable hole inside him from here on out, if this version of him ever has the chance to actually hold his child in his arms. And he knows that feeling entirely too well already.

**

When the big event comes, it's so gentle he almost doesn't realize it's happening.

He feels, at first, only a strong desire to lie quietly on his back on the bed. Hardly an unusual impulse for him. As he lies there, he thinks, first, that the kid is being awfully wriggly today. And then, _Wait, what's going on? Why does it feel tingly? Oh. Oh!_

By the time he yells for Toriel, the protective pouch is already starting to dissolve. By the time she arrives, running faster than he would have thought any monster that size could move, there's an elbow poking out of a spot in the middle.

Toriel is saying something, but he's a little too distracted to make it out, beyond the fact that it involves a lot of _"oh!_ "s, which is kind of nice, because at least he knows that's not just him. Then she's shoving a pillow under his head, at which point he finally realizes just how much he'd been craning his neck vertebrae to see what's been going on in his middle. He starts to say "thanks," or something like it, but then some other body part comes poking out of him. And before he can identify it, the rest of the pouch is suddenly gone, its magic dissolving back into his bones and making him feel, bizarrely, like he's just eaten the biggest, most wonderful meal of his life.

And there, nestled up against his spine, is a tiny skeleton, blinking in confusion at the world. Its ribs are big, like his, but its limbs long, a little like Paps' when he was tiny. Its skull bears the faint shape of a muzzle, tiny pointed fangs, and two flat little stubs of horns. No question whose kid this is. No question.

He feels like he should say something significant, but his mind really isn't working quite right just now, and instead he blurts out, "Holy shit, Tori, we made a baby!"

"Sans! Do not use such language in front of our child!" But she's laughing. She's laughing a rich beautiful laugh unlike any of her laughs he's heard before. He wonders if it's at his reaction, or an expression of her delight. Nah, it's both. Of course it's both.

She scoops the child up and holds it with one arm, then puts the other around him, until somehow she's holding him and they're both holding the baby.

"Welcome, my child!" she says, and her voice sounds... triumphant. That's something he hasn't really heard from her before, either. "Welcome, Sariel!"

Sariel. That's right. Their kid has a _name_. Not a name he would have picked. It doesn't sound very skeleton-y, and, much as he loves wordplay, he can't help thinking that there's a little too much of Asgore's notorious badness with names that's rubbed off there. But he didn't mind letting her choose it. An indirect tribute to poor old Asgore didn't seem like too bad a thing. And, besides, why not let her enjoy making the choice when he never expected the timeline would last long enough for the child to exist?

But the child does exist.

This is his reality.

He and Toriel are no longer alone in the Ruins.

**

And time continues to pass. Faster than ever, with an infant to feed and bathe and play with and love. 

Sans tries to hold on to every moment. _Now_ , he thinks. _Enjoy this moment that you're given. Now, and now, and now, and now._ Every moment is precious, even the ones when Sarry is crying for reasons neither of them can figure out and refusing to go to sleep.

And every night in bed, before he collapses from new-parent exhaustion, he tortures himself by asking the question: Would you make the trade, if you could? If you could get the machine to work again, could use it somehow to exercise power over the timelines, would you make the trade?

Every night he hopes again that Papyrus would forgive the answer he comes up with. But, of course, he knows the answer to that one, too. 

Papyrus would forgive anyone anything. Papyrus would want him to keep going.


	4. PART IV: Why Did the Skeleton Throw the Clock Out the Window?

**PART IV: Why Did the Skeleton Throw the Clock Out the Window?**

"Sans?" Toriel's voice drifts in from the kitchen.

"Yeah?" He pokes his head through the kitchen door and sees her bent intently over a cake she's in the process of frosting. There's flour on her apron, a sight that gives him a pleasant little pang of memory.

"Oh, there you are. It sounds like Sariel is awake. Could you go and get them? I am almost finished with the preparations."

"Sure thing, Tori."

He opens the door to the room that used to be Asgore's and peers in. Tori has good hearing; she's always able to tell when the kid's stirring in here. Maybe it's a benefit of actually having ears. 

"Up already?" he says, as he approaches the crib. "You definitely take after your mom. Dad would still be asleep right now."

The kid's more than up, they're _up_ , standing shakily with their hands gripping the bars of the crib. "Daddy!" they squeal, and in the excitement of seeing him, lose their hold and thunk softly backwards onto their bony butt. For a moment, they seem to be debating whether or not to cry, but then the moment passes, and they let out a high-pitched giggle, instead.

"Good choice, kid. It's always better to laugh than to cry." He leans over the crib, which is just low enough to let him do so, and hauls the child out. They're already getting a little heavy to lift without the use of magic. When exactly did that happen? 

He settles them against his hip, in the position he long ago discovered would let his pelvis comfortably support theirs. "So, hey, buddo, do you know what today is?"

"Daddy!" the kid says, gripping the fabric of his hoodie and snuggling against him.

"Well, yeah. Every day's daddy day. But today's also your birthday. Wait til you see all the great stuff your mom's making you. It's going to be _one_ -derful."

Sariel laughs. Sans doesn't care _what_ Toriel says about child language development. He's willing to swear the kid already understands puns.

He takes Sariel out and puts 'em in the high chair. He's just finishing putting the bib on when Tori comes through from the kitchen, bearing beautifully frosted cake and homemade snail ice cream. 

"I must say, Sans," she says, as she sets the cake on the table. "I am very proud of how this came out."

"Yeah," he says. "The kid did come out pretty well."

They laugh together. "Happy birthday, little one!" says Toriel, kissing her child on the top of their skull. Then she begins to sing, some boss monster birthday song Sans doesn't know. He likes the tune, though. He should get her to teach him the words so he can join in next year.

 _Next year_. Something brushes across the back of his mind at that unexpected thought. Something important.

He puts it away for later, smiles, and cuts a piece of cake.

**

That evening, he lays the drowsy little kid back down in the crib, and nestles their new birthday doll in beside them. He's kind of proud of how that came out, too. Tori did most of the sewing, but he'd actually put in a lot of time working on the head, trying to get the shape of the skull just right. Tori'd pronounced the child to be " _doll_ -ighted" with the gift, and their reluctance to put it down for two minutes ever since seems to have borne that out.

"Night, Sarry," he says. "I'll see you in the morning."

Toriel is already in bed, her reading glasses perched on her nose, and her nose buried in a book. He snuggles in next to her, but for once he doesn't fall instantly asleep.

"Tori?"

"Hmm?" She looks up from her book and smiles at him.

He almost can't bring himself to ask. But then he can't bring himself not to. "How long have I been here?" He's counted of every day of Sariel's life, never wanting to lose the memory of a single one sooner than he has to. But before that? "I mean, how long was I here before we had the kid?"

Toriel sits up a little and blinks at him. Her expression is soft. "Time can be difficult to keep track of here in the Ruins, can it not? Even more than in the rest of the Underground. Let me see..." She looks thoughtful, as if counting in her head. "About two years, I believe, before Sariel was born. Perhaps a little longer."

Three years, then. Or more. 

Three years, without so much as a five-minute glitch. He's certain of that. He would have felt it. He would have _known_. He's learned to pay attention to the signs.

That's longer than the anomaly has ever gone without messing with the timeline at least a little. Longer by months. 

Some feeling stirs inside him. He honestly can't tell if it's hope, or fear, or what.

"Why do you ask?" says Toriel.

"Dunno. Just... seems hard to think of a time without the little squirt," he says.

She gives him a fond look. "It is," she says. 

And when he says nothing else, she leans over and kisses him on the mandible. He touches her lips gently with his fingers, his lipless equivalent of a kiss.

He settles back against the pillow and closes his eyes. "Love you, Tori."

"I love you, too," she says. "Good night, Sans."

In his mind, half asleep, he imagines his child grown. Taller than him, because of course they will be. Almost everybody is. Strong, like their mother. With full-grown horns. A woman he thinks, maybe, based on the flare of their pelvic bones and the pitch of their babble, although it's too early yet to say.

A person with an actual goddamn _future_.

**

"So, Tori," he says, sprawled in his reading chair a few days later, in a moment of peace while Sariel takes another nap. "I've been thinking."

Toriel looks up from her sewing. "Oh dear," she says. "I hope you have not been finding that too _ponder_ ous."

He laughs. "Heh. Good one. But, no, seriously, I've been thinking." He sits up a little straighter. "I'm gonna have to make a run to Snowdin soon."

He hasn't been there much since the kid was born. A few supply runs, that's all. Shortcut in, shortcut out, stopping nowhere he didn't need to be and talking to as few people as possible. People who seemed to have finally given up asking where he's been. He just... hasn't been much interested in the world outside Tori and the kid.

But he _has_ been thinking, and what he's been thinking is: The Ruins are a fine place for two grieving exiles to live out their time, but what kind of place is it for a kid? A kid who's going to _grow up_? There's nothing here. No friends. No challenges, once you've mastered the puzzles. You can't even see the twinkling lights that serve the Underground in place of stars.

"I'm thinking I'll take the kiddo with me," he says, as off-handedly as he can manage. "Let 'em see some of the outside world."

Toriel's face goes hard, blank. "No."

"C'mon, Tori," he says, gently. "They've got to leave the Ruins sometime. We might be okay here forever, but they're gonna need... Well, more of a world to grow up in. You know they do."

"No, Sans. And that is final." She stabs a needle through the baby shirt she's sewing as if it's personally offended her.

He sits forward in the chair. "Why not?" he says.

He knows why not. Why not is because all the children she's seen leave through the exit door have never come back. Why not is because every one of them died, except for the last one, and the last one was almost worse. 

He hates having this conversation more than he's hated doing anything he can remember since he came here, but he makes himself ask again. "Why not, Tori?"

"Because it is not safe!"

"You could come with us."

"You know I will not do that," she says, stabbing the shirt again. "It has been made very clear to me that I am not wanted outside the Ruins."

"It's been years, Tori. Maybe people have changed their minds."

"It is not safe!" She is almost yelling now. Realizing it, she takes a deep breath, and lowers her voice so as not to wake the child. "It is not a place I am welcome. It is not a place my child will be welcome. It is not _safe_."

"It's Snowdin, Tori. I lived there for years. Everyone knows me. Pretty sure they'd welcome _my_ child. And..." He hesitates, but he has to say it. "And it's not like it's a human. Nobody's going to have a reason to hurt the kid."

"I do not care."

"Yes, you do. And, anyway, I'll be there to protect them."

"You?" She laughs. It's a sad and desperate sound, and he hates it.

"Yeah. Me. I won't let anything happen to 'em. I promise, Tori. Hey. I _promise_. And you know how I feel about promises."

" _No._ "

"Yes. I'm sorry, but... yes. You know that sooner or later they're going to want to leave. Better to do it now, when we can watch out for 'em. Better to give 'em what they need from us. Isn't that what parenting is supposed to be about?"

She looks so stricken now, as if she wants to cry but can't. He desperately wants to go to her, to put a hand on her shoulder, but it seems like the wrong move right now. Instead, he looks into her eyes, and wills her to accept what he knows she already understands.

Instead, she rises from her chair, stands straight and tall, and holy crap, he's not sure he's ever realized exactly how _scary_ she can look when she wants to.

"You will do this, then? With or without my agreement."

"I don't want to do it without your agreement, Tori. I want you to think about– "

"Is that a 'yes', Sans?"

He sighs. "I don't know. I guess. Sooner or later. I'm gonna have to. I'm sorry."

"Come with me." She grabs him by the arm, pulls him from his chair and onto his feet, and drags him towards the stairs.

"Tori..."

" _Come,_ " she says, and he does. He's not sure he has a choice. She is pretty damned strong.

She leads him down the stairs, down the corridor that leads to the exit door. What is she doing? Is she going to destroy the exit, block the door? Surely she knows that won't stop him. He can take the kid out whenever he wants. He's never needed a door, not since the day she first let him in.

"Uh, OK, why are we down here?" Another thought suddenly comes to him, a sickening, awful thought. "You're not throwing me out, are you?"

"Don't be ridiculous," she says, and, oh, man, he can _tell_ she's upset when she starts using contractions. "We are down here because I did not want Sariel to hear us fighting."

"We're not fighting," he says, wearily. 

"We are," she says. "If you wish to take my child away from here, we are. You must prove to me that you are strong enough to keep them safe."

"Wh– What?" Whatever he was expecting this isn't it.

"You heard me. You must prove this to me. If you cannot, Sariel will remain here. I want your word."

"Tori, I don't want to fight you."

"Your word, Sans."

He sighs. "Fine. If that's the way you want it, fine. But I really don't think this is– "

She attacks him.

Fire erupts from her hands, balls of flame pelting down around him in a shower of rage and desperation.

He sidesteps it all, easily, and spares her a return attack.

She does it again, and again he dodges.

"Don't want to fight you," he says. "I really don't."

"No!" She towers above him, her eyes glittering and narrow. "If you love me, Sans, if you love our child, then _you will fight_!" She sends another rain of fireballs at him, her hands directing them now with wide, forceful gestures. He knows she's not trying to kill him, but he suspects that if he actually let one of those land, it would _hurt_.

He dodges. And then he stands very still.

"Okay," he says. "If this is what it takes, okay." He closes his eyes and concentrates, and when he opens them again, half his vision is tinted in yellow and blue.

He raises his hand. Bones crash down from the ceiling, up from the floor. Blasters spin around her, the sound of their firing so loud he's afraid they're going to wake the baby, after all.

He lowers his hand. She stands immobile in a circle of blue bones. There is a cratered, smoking ring of destruction on the floor around her. 

Her fur isn't even singed, and he sags with relief as the colored light fades from his vision and lets him see this for certain. His control is good, his control has always been good, but it's been a long, _long_ time, and if he'd hurt her, if he'd...

Well. Good thing he doesn't need to think about that. 

Her face is a mask of shock. For a moment, neither of them says anything, neither of them does anything. Then she moves her hand, in the gesture of mercy.

Shaking a little, he dismisses the last of the bones. "Good enough?" he says. "Because I really, _really_ never want to have to do that again."

"S– Sans. I did not.... I did not know you could..."

"Yeah," he says, unable to stop himself. "Yeah, there's a lot of things you don't know about me."

He turns and goes up the stairs.

**

He's sitting on the bed later, staring at nothing, when she comes to him. "I am sorry," she says, softly, sitting down beside him.

"You don't need to be," he says. "We want the same thing, T. You love the kid, I love the kid."

"I know. I just..." She puts a hand on his shoulder and grips it tight.

"Yeah," he says. "I know. I really, really do."

She leans into him and puts her arms around him, and he thinks maybe they're going to be okay. Maybe all three of them are going to be okay.


	5. PART V: Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road?

**PART V: Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road?**

He decides to walk to Snowdin this time. After all, the point of the exercise is to let the kid see some of the world outside the Ruins. Might as well let them see as much of it as possible, right? So he leaves through the door, while, somewhere upstairs, Toriel frets alone, unable to bring herself to see them off. He feels bad about that. Terrible, actually. But he figures it will be good for her when they come back unharmed, when that part of her soul that can't bring itself to believe in the possibility of a child returning to her sees solid proof that this one can and will.

Well. That's what he hopes, anyway.

Who knows? Maybe one day he'll even convince her to come out with them. He kind of hopes so. He can carry the kid without too much trouble right now, in a sling that holds them cuddled up against his ribs, but she'll probably still be able to do it when they're an adult, and he's not sure how much longer he has before they're as big as he is.

Of course, he could just float 'em along with magic, but Tori hates it when he does that, and he already feels guilty enough.

He looks down at the kid as the two of them take their first steps into the forest. Sariel's eye sockets are huge, the lights in them incredibly bright.

"Yeah," he says. "The world's an interesting place, huh?"

He stops now and then and bends down to let the kid pick up a handful of snow and marvel at its coldness and the way it slips through their fingers. He answers their endless wordless queries as they go, responding to each excited point of the child's finger with, "That's a tree. And that's a tree. And, yup, that's another tree." Well, they _are_ very different trees to the few found in the Ruins.

To be honest, he's probably looking around him with almost as much interest as the kid. It's been a long time since he's been this way.

Which is probably why it takes him by surprise when he comes across the faded pattern of Xs and Os on the ground.

"Oh, man," he whispers, as the kid squirms against him, trying to figure out why he's stopped. Trying to get a better look. Now that he thinks about it, he's probably passed more of these, covered over by years of snow. He wonders why this one's still clear. Some random trick of the wind, or has someone made an effort? Kids, maybe, coming out here to play? It's a nice thought. Even if, come to think of it, he hasn't seen anyone at all on the road to town so far.

"Daddy?" 

"Yeah, buddo. Hang on a sec. Here, Daddy's gonna put you down for a minute, OK?" He unslings the carrier and sits the child down atop a fallen log, where they immediately become fascinated picking at the bark.

Then, quietly and efficiently, he re-calibrates the puzzle. "There, bro. Better late than never, huh?" 

He re-positions the sling, picks up his child, and methodically sets about changing all the Xs into Os. He feels... Less sad than he'd expected, actually. Which is still pretty sad. But he kind of wants to smile.

"Come on, kid. Let's take you out on the town ."

**

The journey is longer than he remembers it being – probably because he almost never did make the whole thing on foot, even back in the days when patrolling the area was part of his job description – and by the time he arrives at the town, he's feeling tired. So is Sariel. (Though fortunately it's the "falling asleep against Daddy's rib cage" kind of tired, not the "fussing and crying" kind.)

And so, he thinks, with a faint sense of surprise, is the town.

He pauses in front of the "Welcome to Snowdin" sign and takes in its sorry state. It's weathered and faded, the "welcome" part almost unreadable. Someone used to repaint it every year, he remembers. Papyrus had always tried to get him to help. But it looks like no one's bothered since he left.

It's not just the sign. There's trash blowing through the streets, a broken window in the Snowdin Shop that someone's taped up but not bothered to fix. There's something about it that reminds him of his old room. Like it's a whole town full of people who don't see the point in picking up their socks.

When did this happen? Or has it slowly been happening for the last three years, and he hasn't been paying enough attention?

A voice comes from behind him, cutting off his thoughts. "Hey! Hey, it's Sans! You're back!"

He turns. It's Bigmouth, the plant monster. The one who used to hang around Grillby's telling disgusting stories while other people were trying to eat. "Uh, hey, Big. Yeah, it's me. How's it going?"

"LOOK EVERYBODY, IT'S SANS!" Bigmouth isn't just called that because it's literally true. His voice _carries_ , and within seconds, people are wandering down the street in his direction and popping out of buildings to see what all the shouting's about. His own little, furry welcoming crowd. People are shouting his name, asking where he's been. It's a bit overwhelming, and it suddenly hits him just how very isolated the three of them have been in the Ruins.

"What's that you've got there, Sans?" says one of the bunnies, and, as if on cue, Sariel stirs and pokes their little face out of the sling. Sans immediately worries that this unexpected crowd of unexpected strangers is going to be too much for them and prepares himself for wails of fear, but Sariel only babbles cheerfully and tries to grab the bunny's whiskers as he leans forward to look at the kid. 

"Is that a _baby_?" someone else says. The lady who does the crosswords in the newspaper. 

"Yeah." He shrugs, trying to play it casual. "My kid. Thought I'd show 'em my old stomping grounds. Try not to spook 'em, huh? They're not used to strangers."

Sariel tries to stick a finger up the bunny's nose and laughs.

"Uh, sorry about that," says Sans, gently pulling the child's hand away. "Hey, rule of life, kid. You can pick your friends, and you can pick your nose, but you can't pick your friend's nose."

But the bunny – what _is_ his name? Laggy? Lagoon? _Lago_ , that's it. Lago the bunny's just looking quizzically at the kid. He appears to be studying the shape of their skull, and fixating a little too hard on the barely-there stubs of their horns.

"Geez, Sans," says someone else, and this time Sans doesn't even bother to pay attention to who it is. "Where the hell did you get a kid?"

"Think I've got a guess," says Lago, straightening up and looking down at him. "I heard a rumor you were with the queen, but I never would have guessed you were actually _with_ the queen!" He gestures towards the kid. "But that's the most boss monster-looking skeleton I've ever seen."

A gasp goes through the crowd, a ripple of shocked murmuring, and he finds himself thinking, shit, maybe this _was_ a bad idea, maybe Tori was right, maybe they do just hate her and everyone that has to do with her. He tenses, prepared to shortcut the both of them right back to the Ruins, already thinking how he's going to make his apology to her.

But someone asks, shyly and tentatively, "How– how _is_ the queen?" And someone else says, "Is she still alive?" And someone says, "Do you see her? Can you talk to her? Can you tell her– ?"

And then the individual voices are drowned out under a cacophony of overlapping questions and pleas, but the one thing he can make out, because it keeps repeating over and over, is: "When is she coming back?"

"OK," he says. Nobody seems to hear him. "OK!" he shouts until the chaotic babble stops. "I am not having this conversation standing out here in the snow. Anybody wants to talk to me about Toriel, come and see me in Grillby's."

**

Sans feeds his last soggy french fry to the child on his lap, and wipes a smear of ketchup from their face with his sleeve. "Yeah," he says for the thirty-seventh time, this time to Bruney the bear monster. "I'll tell her."

The bear fails to take the hint in Sans' tone and leave them alone. "The whole political system has collapsed," he grumbles. "No more fish lady! No more king! We may have been fine without a mayor, but thaaaaaaat's ridiculous!"

"Yeah, I hear ya, Bruney." He looks around. Not all the monsters from the street have followed him in here, but more seem to have heard what was going on and headed over. The place is more packed than he's ever seen it. Grillby has got to owe him one for this. Maybe he can get free fries out of it.

"You can maybe understand, though," he says to the crowd at large, "Why she'd want to stay where she is. The way I hear it, last time she came out, an angry mob came after her. And you should know... she hasn't changed her mind about humans."

Bruney looks at one of the bunnies standing next to him, who looks at her sister the shopkeeper, who looks uncomfortable, but speaks up. "The thing is, Sans..." 

"We know you've got good reasons to hate humans," says Bruney.

"And we all miss Papyrus, very much," says the innkeeper. "He was a good person."

"But," the shopkeeper says, "whether she wants to kill humans or make friends with them, I don't think it really matters all that much. If Asgore and Undyne couldn't collect enough souls to bring the barrier down, I'm not sure anyone can."

"And if Asgore hadn't had everyone trying to kill that last human," says her sister, "Well, maybe they wouldn't have done what they did."

"Not that we blame Asgore," says the shopkeeper. "At least he _cared_."

"Like the queen," says Bruney. 

"Like the queen," says the innkeeper. "She cared about us. She tried to bring us hope, even if it wasn't the same kind of hope Asgore did. People need that right now. Nobody seems to care about anything."

"No one believes there's much of a future, is the problem," says the shopkeeper. "And they might be right about that. But it would still be good to have someone who cares. You know?"

Sans sits very, very quietly for a moment. "And the angry mob?" he says at last. "What about them?"

"I have family in New Home," says a new voice. Mantrel the mouse monster, who's been hovering quietly on the edge of the conversation. "They say people there feel the same way. They say the rioters were just a few people, that they've mostly been quiet since." He preens his whiskers nervously. "Everyone else... I think they'd like her back, too."

"I'll see what I can do, " he says. And then, with a slowly widening grin and a warm feeling that has nothing to do with the over-heated air of the bar, "Seems like maybe she's _throne_ away a good opportunity."

**

Eager as he is to get home and talk to Toriel, he has one more stop to make.

"Well, kiddo, this is where Daddy used to live." He's glad to see that the old house isn't in bad shape. It's dusty, and the abandoned holiday lights on the porch are sagging and broken, but no one's disturbed it any.

Papyrus's bedroom, too, is exactly how he left it. Still waiting for his brother to return.

Sans goes to the bookshelf and pulls out a ragged, much-loved copy of _Peek-a-boo with Fluffy Bunny_. "I think you'll like this one, kid," he says. "The ending always gets me."

Then he walks over to the bed, picks up the scarf, and puts it in his pocket.

He slips into the basement and spends a long moment starting at the machine, until Sariel, finally growing bored, starts to fuss and squirm.

Then he takes a shortcut home.

**

"So, yeah. That's what everybody said." Sans slumps back a little against the headboard of their bed. He feels even more tired than Sariel, who somehow fell asleep on the shortcut home and has been conked out ever since. And he has the feeling he's going to be even tireder by the time this conversation's done. But it's time. It's long past time, really.

"Thank you for telling me." He can't even make out the mixture of emotions on her face. Sadness, gratitude, resentment, hope? "It is nice to know there are some who remember me fondly."

They both know she's deliberately missing the point, so he doesn't bother saying it, just cuts right to the chase. "I think you should go out. I think you should at least talk to them, Tori."

"I do not see what good that would do." She draws her legs up under her. It's an oddly vulnerable-looking position. "I have nothing to offer them."

"Pretty sure that's not true."

"But it is true, Sans." She lowers her head a little, and he wonders if she's trying not to cry, trying not to let him see. "They need hope, do they not? And I cannot offer them that."

"In my personal experience, you're actually really good at that," he says.

She shakes her head. "I cannot break the barrier for them. I will not. Not at the cost of human souls, even if it leaves us trapped here forever. As it will. That is the only hope they want, and it is no hope at all."

"Yeah." He takes in a big, physically unnecessary breath. "About that... What if... Uh, what if I told you there might be another way to do that?"

Her face scrunches up in confusion. "What? What other way? And if you know of such a thing, why would you not have said something before?"

"So." He pulls his knees up against his rib cage. "I'm gonna tell you a story. It's... Well, it's one of about a million things I should probably have told you a long time ago."

"All right?" She still looks confused, but she touches his hand briefly, and he's terribly grateful for that touch.

"So, yeah. Okay. Once upon a time, there was a brilliant scientist named W. D. Gaster. He was my mom. Well, you'd say my dad."

"Oh!" He's not surprised that she's surprised. He hasn't talked about any family other than Papyrus to her. Of course, there are reasons for that.

"He was the Royal Scientist. The one before Alphys." Seeing her face he adds, "Yeah, I know, you're gonna say there _was_ no Royal Scientist before Alphys, or at least not for a long time. But he was. You probably even met him. You just don't remember it."

She looks almost as much concerned as she does confused now, but she says nothing and waits for him to continue.

"So, you maybe know Alphys was working on ways to break the barrier by creating a substitute for a human soul, trying to extract the important qualities from human souls and find a way to duplicate them. Far as I know, she didn't get very far with it. But Gaster had a different approach. He was trying to manipulate reality."

"Manipulate... reality?"

"Yeah. Space and time. That's the first thing he tried. The first thing _we_ tried. I was his assistant."

"You were right," she says quietly, "when you said there were things I did not know about you." 

He looks into her eyes, worried, but the expression he sees there is soft, not angry. Not hurt. 

He probably doesn't deserve this woman.

"He thought, if he could find a way to get someone _outside_ the barrier, it wouldn't be too difficult to collect some human souls out there and bring it down," Sans continues, looking away again. "This was before Asgore started his soul collection." He shrugs. "You asked me once how I do the shortcuts, and I never really answered you. But it's not exactly a natural talent. We needed someone to volunteer for the experiment. I never could get out there, though. I don't think it's just that I can't get somewhere I haven't seen. The magic of the barrier itself seemed to stop us."

She makes a small noise. He doesn't meet her eyes.

"So he came up with another idea. He built a machine. A machine that'd let him access the void outside our reality. He figured, if he could observe the structure our world is made of, he could change it. Rewrite reality so the barrier didn't exist."

"Oh, Sans." Her voice is a near whisper, and her hand covers his again. "What happened?"

"Welp, you could say it worked a little too well. He got outside our reality, all right. He just never came back. And he broke the machine in the process."

"I am sorry." Her hand strokes his.

"Yeah, it kind of sucked. But that's not why I'm telling you this. Thing is..." He looks into her eyes again. "Given enough time, I think I can fix the machine. But that leads to the other thing I need to tell you, and I'm not sure how you're gonna take it."

She lets out a sad little snort. "I have endured many things in my time, Sans. I do not believe anything you have to tell me will make things worse."

"Yeah, you say that _now_. Well, OK. Here goes. Man, I haven't talked to _anybody_ about this. It's gonna feel weird. Right. I'll start with a question. Have you ever experienced deja vu? Felt like you'd been through something before, already knew someone you know you never met? Dreamed or even sort of remembered places you'd never been, things you'd never done, but couldn't shake the feeling that it was somehow _real_?"

"I... Yes, of course. Sometimes... Sometimes when the human children fell, I could not help but feel as if I had known them before. Does that mean something?"

"Hoo boy. Yeah, it means something. It means you'd probably met them before. See, time's been really weird for a really long, uh, time. With our equipment, I was able to detect it, but once you know it's happening, once you start paying attention to those little traces of earlier realities, it's easy to notice. Something – we called it the anomaly, although I'm pretty sure now that there was more than one of them – was messing with time. Letting it pass normally for a while, and then just... undoing it. Going back, maybe a few minutes, maybe a _lot_ longer. Changing things. And every time it created a new timeline, the old one just ceased to exist, except for those little echoes. It got over-written. I think that's why nobody remembers Gaster very well, by the way. Once he fell out of reality, every timeline after that, he was a little more... gone. Even I don't remember him as much as I'd like."

He can see she's thinking, thinking hard. Does she understand the implications of all this? Does he really want to explain them to her if she doesn't?

He continues quickly. "So, uh, that's the problem, y'see? I could maybe fix the machine, make sure what happened to him can't ever happen again, fire up a new research program and try to start understanding the concepts we need in order to understand the concepts we need in order to actually change things so the barrier comes down. But that's a years-long project. Probably a couple decades. And the timeline never lasted anywhere near that long. So there didn't seem to be much point in bothering."

"This is a great deal to take in, Sans." She seems to have gone very still.

"Welp, let me get to the point, then. As the ant said when it crawled onto the pencil." He smiles. She doesn't smile back. "Point is, the timeline's been rock-solid for the last three years. Not so much as a hiccup. It's never done that before. _Never._ So..." He hesitates. It almost feels like saying it out loud is going to jinx it or something, but he makes himself continue. "So, I think it's over. I think this may be it, the last timeline. I think there's a good chance it'll never happen again." He leans forward, and his hand clutches at hers. "D'ya see what I'm saying, Tori?"

"I do see," she says softly. "I see that all of this, our life together, our child. You did not believe that it would last." 

He can't quite manage to answer. 

She squeezes his hand, then slowly leans towards him, resting her forehead against his.

They sit like that for a moment, silently. 

Finally, "Yeah," he says. "Like I said, it sucked." His voice is shaking a little. He makes it stop, makes himself smile as he straightens up. "But what I'm trying to say is... I think maybe we can offer 'em some hope. Human soul-free." He can't help thinking of the prophecy. He's no angel, he knows. But he thinks he's probably seen the surface, sometime in another life. He's dreamt about it too vividly and too often. So maybe he _can_ be the one. If nothing else, it's worth working for. Isn't it? 

He squeezes her hand again and waits for... He's not sure what. For her to argue. For her to tell him how betrayed she feels by all the secrets he's kept from her.

Instead, he finds himself surrounded by boss monster, enveloped in a bone-crushing hug.

"Sans," she says, and he can hear tears of happiness in her voice, "You are a _miracle_. How is it you always bring me exactly what I did not know I needed?"

"Guess I'm just a lucky bonehead," he says, and they both begin to laugh as they cry.

**

It's a beautiful day. Outside, birds are singing. On the floor of the newly reclaimed throne room, golden flowers silently bathe in the light that shines through the ceiling.

Sans sits on the smaller throne, his feet dangling several inches above the floor. "I dunno, Tori, this chair's comfortable and all, but I feel ridiculous sitting in it. I'm not a king. I'm just a guy who used to sell hot dogs."

"You are my husband, Sans." It's a word they've only just begun to use, and it still makes him duck his head and smile. "That chair is yours." Toriel looks down at the child on her lap. "Is that not right, Prince Sariel?"

"Geez. " Sans runs a hand over his skull. "This is going to take some getting used to."

"Well," she says, and smiles at him. "We have time."

"Yeah." They sit in silence for a moment, except for the sounds of birds and the clacking of Sarry's bones as the kid plays patty-cake with themself. 

"Speaking of which, sort of..." he says at last. "Um... There's something I've been meanin' to ask you."

"Yes?"

"I was thinking. I mean, I was wondering. And I wanted to ask you, if you thought it was a good idea. I mean, not right away, obviously, because we're pretty busy right now, what with getting the lab set up, and cleaning the cobwebs out of the castle and stuff, but maybe sometime soon, if you wanted to..." Oh, man. He cannot stop this sentence. It has gotten away from him completely and is about to go barreling off a cliff.

"Sans. Sans!"

"Sorry. I just wanted to ask... If maybe you might like to have another kid?"

"Oh!" He's shocked her, he can see, but she's smiling. She reaches across the gap between their chairs and takes his hand. "I would like that very much," she says.

He feels some tension go out of him, something that feels like it's been there for a very, very long time. "Whew. Good. Well, in that case, I've got one more thing I'd like to ask."

"Yes, my love?" Oh, man, the smile she's giving him now is downright sappy. He likes it a lot.

"I was thinking, maybe we could name it after my brother." He looks into her eyes, and he sees that he doesn't have to explain. That she understands.

"Of course," she says. "Of course we will."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LittleKnownArtist did some _amazing_ illustrations for this chapter! [Go and check 'em out](http://miyori999.deviantart.com/art/Finally-Dove-Deadfirst-Into-the-Deep-End-685585428)!


	6. Epilogue: When It's Ajar

**Epilogue: When It's Ajar**

Twenty-three years later, they stand on the surface, bathed in the light of the sun. Sans holds the hand of his wife the queen, and blinks with amazement at the sky. The sight feels familiar, but it's entirely new. This is the first time. The first _real_ time. The one that counts.

Behind them, the two new fallen humans stand, talking quietly among themselves about the plans they've made to smooth the re-introduction of humans and monsters. They're smiling as wide as he is, and why shouldn't they be? The queen has kept her promise to get them home.

To his and Toriel's right stands their daughter Sariel, sunlight glinting on her horns. To their left, their son Papyrus closes his eyes and tilts his face towards the sky.

The sun on his skin, Sans thinks, remembering something his brother said a very long time ago. The sun on his skin, and the wind in his hair.

"Welp," he says, "after all that work we did to get here, howzabout we go and see some more of this surface world? I gotta say, so far it seems pretty _outstanding_."

The all groan until they laugh. Even the humans, and they never seem to appreciate his jokes quite as much as his family does.

Toriel takes his arm, and together they start down the road, their children leading the way. Sans finds himself looking at them, at the excited, awe-struck way they're gazing around them, more than he does at the mountain or the sun, or the sky. It's a good sight.

They make their way down the mountain, hopeful and free, their laughter ringing out into the sky. 

Heirs to a better world.


End file.
